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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26149150">J'adoube</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/MossPiglet/pseuds/MossPiglet'>MossPiglet</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Great Mouse Detective (1986)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Near Death Experiences, basil is very conflicted about this and not good at comfort, but like comfort might be a strong word for it, creative liberties with the placement of big ben, discussion of injury care, identity crisis for everyone, recent injuries</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-28</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-11-06</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 11:47:23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>5,793</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26149150</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/MossPiglet/pseuds/MossPiglet</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Basil of Baker Street has dedicated his life to pursuing Professor Ratigan. After the criminal mastermind's fall from the clock tower, Basil has to face the reality that he might not want the game to end.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Basil of Baker Street &amp; David Dawson, Basil of Baker Street/Padraic Ratigan, David Dawson &amp; Padraic Ratigan</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>55</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>74</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. After the Fall</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Basil had waited almost thirty-six hours before he went looking for the body. He had even almost slept, but the whirring inside of him wouldn’t cease. After he, Dr. Dawson, and the Flavershams had descended to the ground, the good doctor had insisted on patching him up immediately. Basil appreciated it, he had made sure to tell the doctor as much, and he was sure he would not have been permitted before the Queen in such a state if the circumstances had not been so great. The article in the evening news had artfully described his appearance as “heroic”- he knew “bedraggled” would have been more accurate, but he accepted the flattery. Once the good doctor and the concerned young woman who had brought a new case had left him alone, Basil collapsed into his chair. He lit his pipe, picked up the remains of his violin with his good arm, and stared at the portrait on his mantle.</p><p>It was a relief, once again, to have no friends or close acquaintances who might have asked him what he was thinking or -heaven forbid- what he was <em>feeling</em>. He couldn’t have formed a coherent answer to either question. He knew he was feeling something, but everything was tumbling in and out of his periphery, never staying put long enough for him to get a good look at it, falling and colliding and collapsing and exploding inside of him so that he could barely manage to keep breathing. The chaos was blurring into a fog, dulling his senses. The only things he felt fully aware of were his pipe, the neck of his violin, the pain of his injuries, and the portrait staring back at him.</p><p>As the room around him began to lighten with the dawn, he had his first clear thought of the night. That wasn’t the first time he had lost hours of his life to those eyes, but it should be the last. He had accomplished his goal, hadn’t he? He’d defeated the vile Professor Padraic Ratigan. He could move on to new pursuits now, if he wanted. So why didn’t he feel free? Why did he still feel the weight of those eyes on his soul?</p><p>Ratigan had fallen almost two hundred feet, he couldn’t have survived. Basil <em>knew</em> that.  Basil told himself that he knew that. Basil wanted to believe that he knew that. His enemy stared down at him smugly.</p><p>Basil plucked his fingers abruptly on the strings of his violin, producing a horrific sound that got him moving. He needed to know, with complete certainty, that Ratigan was dead. He knew the authorities would consider it a waste to go looking for a body, not so late after the fact and not when the villain had fallen from such a height to begin with. Not to mention the police force thought worthiest investigative techniques were a waste of time and manpower already. It briefly crossed his mind to consult with Dr. Dawson on the matter, but somehow that seemed an impossible task. The doctor was a good, simple, honest, kind man. He could not impose on him for what would surely turn out to be a foolish, self-indulgent pursuit.</p><p>“I suppose it’s up to me to verify your demise, Professor,” Basil said to the portrait, trying to take a pull from his pipe and realizing it had been out for some time.</p><p> </p><p>--</p><p> </p><p>Basil was forcing himself to stay collected, but it was becoming difficult. He had asked Toby to assist him in his task as the dog’s speed and sense of smell would be invaluable, however even those advantages had yet to make any evidence of Ratigan’s body appear. Initially they had circled around the base of the clock tower searching for the body itself. It would have been in terrible shape after a fall from such a height, Basil expected little more than a puddle of fur and viscera. When they did not find a body however, Basil wasn’t terribly concerned. He should have expected someone or something to come by and dispose of a <em>dead rat</em> by now. Some hungry scavenger or tidy grounds keeper would have removed the most obvious evidence, so Basil and Toby would just have to look closer for smaller remnants.</p><p>Basil had dismounted Toby carefully, minding his injured arm, and instructed his companion to go around the building again, paying special attention to smells. He wished that he had managed to keep ahold of a scrap of Ratigan’s waistcoat or cravat, something with his scent to send Toby after. Basil instructed the dog to come and get him if he detected any rat blood around the building and hoped that would be specific enough. The detective himself set to searching the region directly under the clock face he and his foe had fought upon two nights prior. He pulled his magnifying glass from his pocket and inspected the ground for any sign of blood or impact.</p><p>As he turned about, a flash of sunlight reflected into his eye and disoriented him. He stumbled back and fell into a patch of dirt under the edge of the building, obscured from human eyes by shrubbery above him. He reached out with his hands for his glass, temporarily blinded by the light, and he was suddenly overwhelmed with how vulnerable he was. The voices of passing humans echoed in his ears like Ratigan’s rough, unhinged laughter.</p><p>He had almost died – several times in the past few days in fact. He had had close brushes with death before, he often considered it a sign of a job well done. But two nights ago, he had almost died, and he was suddenly struck with the realization that Ratigan may not have meant it. The rat had been lunging at him, inarguably trying to kill him in the moments leading up to Basil’s own fall off the clock hand, yes. But in that last instant, that lightning flash of a moment when Ratigan’s claws had grabbed ahold of Basil’s coat, he’d just been trying not to fall. He’d been clinging to the only thing he could to save his life and that had been Basil, and it hadn’t worked.</p><p>Basil forced breath after shuddering breath down his throat. The last thing he had said to Professor Ratigan, to his greatest adversary, to the only worthy opponent he’d ever had, was “The game’s not over yet!”</p><p>But the game was over. The game was over and Padraic Ratigan was dead. So why didn’t Basil feel like he had won?</p><p>The hollow feeling inside of him was compounded as he forced himself to resume searching. There was no blood. There were no scraps of fabric or beetle-shell buttons. There was no sign that anything had landed from a great height. Even if something had come along and eaten the corpse, some evidence would have been left and Basil would have found it. His suspicions were confirmed when Toby returned over two hours after they had parted and gave no indication that he had found anything either.</p><p>Basil turned and looked at the river.</p><p>It had been foggy that night and he hadn’t watched Ratigan fall. He’d been too preoccupied with surviving himself. It was possible, just possible, that the rat had somehow fallen into the waters.</p><p>“Toby, dear boy, why don’t we run along home and have some tea?” Basil offered to the long-eared dog, who was by now growing tired. Toby readily agreed, happy as ever to be spending his day with the detective. Basil wouldn’t let himself dwell on the fact that this dog was likely the closest thing he had to a friend. At least Toby didn’t ask him personal questions.</p><p> </p><p>--</p><p> </p><p>It was late in the afternoon by the time the pair returned to the river front, a way downstream from the clock tower. Toby had eaten and rested upstairs while Basil set to work performing calculations of current and pulling out maps of the sewer system to compare with. He had established the most likely locations where Ratigan’s body would have washed into, if it was to lodge anywhere. There was always the possibility that it would stay in the river along the whole course and run right out to sea, but Basil still felt the need to investigate. He needed to pursue any possibility that he might lay eyes on what had once been Professor Ratigan, criminal mastermind.</p><p>Thus the detective and his companion were down on the banks of the river as the sun began to get low in the sky. Toby was sniffing around for the scent of dead rat and Basil kept his eyes peeled for any sign that a body might have been removed. They had already checked two of the sewer openings which he had marked out on his map as being the most likely places. If the body had been taken farther into the sewer by the current, or dragged in by the fetid creatures of the darkness, then Basil would not be able to look for it with Toby. The dog would not venture into the sewers more than a few feet before growing nervous and refusing to take another step, and Basil didn’t blame him. It was absolutely disgusting down there, so filthy he could hardly stand to breathe. Not to mention he had heard tales of much bigger beasts than the Professor living in these depths.</p><p>“Just down this next bend, Toby, mind your footing now,” Basil cautioned. He looked over Toby’s head in the direction they were traveling, noting the slick algal scum coating the stones. His mind was briefly diverted with the implications of the alga and how it might be used in future cases or investigations of the natural world, but he forced himself back to his present undertaking. <em>This is no time for distractions</em>, he admonished himself.</p><p>Toby moved slowly along the stones, making sure to smell along the ground as he went while also avoiding the largest patches of alga, but there were still more than a few stumbles and Basil was relieved when they made it to level ground.</p><p>“Good work, old boy, steady on,” he said, rubbing Toby’s ear with his left hand. His right arm, his dominant one, had been injured during the fight on the clock face and he was becoming increasingly frustrated with having to rely on his left. The doctor had said that the arm would heal and be of use soon, but it seemed that Basil and Dr. Dawson had different definitions of the word “soon.” Basil had been ignoring the pain in his arm and the great gashes across his back and chest fairly well until that point in the day, but it was beginning to be difficult.</p><p>He could see the entrance to the sewer up ahead of them. It was a small hole, the diameter only about half Toby’s height, and below the slimy brick platform they were currently standing on. The previous stops had involved larger openings which Toby was able to carry Basil some ways into, at least as far as either of them were willing to go, but Basil knew that he would have try this one alone.</p><p>“Delightful,” he hissed to himself. Toby stopped above the drain and lowered his shoulders so that Basil could dismount easier. “Now, wait here, and keep an ear open for me if I call to you,” he instructed. Toby dutifully raised his right ear in Basil’s direction to show that he understood and Basil set to climbing down and into the sewer entrance. It was inelegant to say the least. Once he’d scrambled fully inside and was no longer at risk of falling into the Thames himself, he straightened out his coat and arm sling and surveyed his surroundings. This pipe was much darker than the others had been because of the later hour and the smaller size, but his mouse eyes adjusted quickly. He shuddered. Smaller sewer pipes were prone to accumulating waste, he mentally noted. He hoped that might keep away most of the inhabitants of the underground, at least.</p><p>He began to look around for anything which might be out of the ordinary, particularly anything which looked recently disturbed. His foot made a sickening squelch as he stepped forward and he looked down, which was when he found it.</p><p>An iridescent glimmer, bottle green, faceted, with two precise little holes in the center. At the beginning of his pursuit of the Professor, he had once spent three weeks attempting to track down every manufacturer and distributor of beetle-shell buttons in the city. Back then he’d had no other lead to Ratigan to go on. He snatched the shiny button up from the muck on the ground and held it up under his magnifying glass. There was no doubt. He would know these buttons anywhere. He wiped it against his coat, slipped it into his pocket, and looked ahead with apprehension.</p><p>He had thought he was ready to find the remains of his foe, but now he wasn’t sure. The button made everything more definitive. It hit him, finally, that he truly could find the corpse of Professor Padraic Ratigan in that sewer pipe and then the game would be over. He turned to look at the water behind him, but firmly shook his head. He couldn’t go back without knowing. If the answer was in the sewer, he would find it.</p><p>He moved deeper inside and the light faded away rapidly until it was dark as night. His whiskers began twitching furtively, sensing out for the walls of the pipe, helping him to keep his footing. There were strange wave marks in parts of the sludge under his feet, as though something had been dragged or pushed along the passage with a slight side to side motion. Several times Basil stumbled over a pile of debris and had to steady himself with a hand against the wall, but when his shoe became stuck tumbled to his knees. He hauled himself back to his feet using the wall, and with the close proximity his whiskers felt something was different there. He turned to inspect the wall more closely.</p><p>Just ahead of his own hand there was a clear, deep handprint made into the slime on the wall. He pulled his own hand away to compare. The other print was more than twice as large as his and at the end of each finger was a sharp point, missing from Basil’s own print. A twinge went through the deep slashes on his back and he twitched his similarly cut nose. Claws.</p><p>Prints like that didn’t happen accidentally. It was almost impossible that Ratigan’s body could have been washed in by the current in such a way to push his hand against the wall that forcefully. No- he would not let himself jump to the conclusion that this was Ratigan’s handprint, just because it was a rat’s. This didn’t have to mean Ratigan was alive, just that some rat was alive down there, he forced himself to believe.</p><p>“Of course it would be you,” came a voice that stopped his breath cold.</p><p>In the shadows, just at the edge of where he could see, there was a large, clawed foot. Basil turned slowly, his body half fighting itself over which direction to run.</p><p>“Wh-what?” he stuttered, staring at the foot. The voice said something too quiet for him to hear and it drew Basil forward, step by step, until he could see the whole of Ratigan before him.</p><p>“You’re so persistent, Basil,” he trailed off, his voice so weak it was mostly just breath. Basil could not understand what he was seeing. He had found the body of Ratigan, but there was still life in it. Ratigan was not supposed to still be alive.</p><p>“What do you mean?” Basil heard his own voice as though it came from someone else. It took Ratigan so long to respond that Basil began to think that maybe he hadn’t heard, but then that voice came even weaker still.</p><p>“Even in death, you pursue me,” and then he was silent and Basil was sure he could not hear or respond anymore. Basil grabbed at one of his foe’s wrists and counted, the pulse was present but weak as Ratigan’s occasional breath. What Basil could see of the larger man’s body was in terrible condition, so much filth and blood and fur matted together that he couldn’t even tell where the injuries might begin.</p><p>If he left Ratigan here, Basil estimated that the rat would be dead by morning if not sooner. He may have been lucky enough to land in a part of the sewer which no other rat ventured into, which had likely saved the Professor until then. But Basil knew he was looking at a man who would certainly die of his injuries unless something was done. Unless Basil did something. He knew the right thing to do. This had always been the endgame, hadn’t it? One of them was always going to die first. He should finish the game.</p><p>“Toby!”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Coming Clean</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Basil hadn’t accounted for how much heavier than himself a rat would be. Ratigan was fully unconscious and limp as a dead fish, so Basil did his best to roll the Professor over and get under him. As he pulled and crawled along the drain, Basil become thoroughly coated in the sludge around them. It was soaking through his trousers, seeping into his shoes, squelching between his fingers, while on his back was the constant, pressing weight of the rat. When Ratigan’s snout flopped over Basil’s shoulder, the sudden contact of the Professor’s cheek on the fur of his neck was almost too much for Basil to bear and he started shaking. He almost lost his foe off of his back before reaching up to grab a hold of one of Ratigan’s arms to keep him in place. By the time Basil got to the mouth of the pipe, he was gasping for breath despite the fetid air.</p><p>He was able to coax Toby into reaching down and gently taking the unconscious rat into his mouth for transport, then Basil made his own way up. On the ride back to Baker Street Basil did his best to tune out the sensations of the city. He had experienced more than enough of the world for one day and the stench of the sewer had seeped into every part of him, invading his mind. He closed his eyes and tucked his head into the back of Toby’s neck and tried to focus only on holding on to the dog’s short fur.</p><p>The detective only became aware of his surroundings when Toby was startled by a carriage taking the curve in front of them too quickly and gave a growl around the rat in his mouth.</p><p>“Steady on old boy, steady,” Basil comforted, hoping that the dog wouldn’t cause any more injuries to the body still in his mouth. Looking around, Basil saw that they were only a block away from Baker Street. “Take me right up to my door, Toby. Let’s get as close as you can.” Toby paused on the side walk for a moment before gently shaking off the scare from the carriage. Moving on, he delivered Basil right to the front steps of the cellar of Baker Street.</p><p>“Now Toby, wait here just a moment and keep <em>him</em>,” Basil pointed at Ratigan still held gingerly in Toby’s mouth, “safe. I’ll be right back to collect him.”</p><p>When Basil entered his abode he found Mrs. Judson tidying the place up just as he had expected. She was still picking feathers out of various places after his recent firearms experiment and she currently had a handful of them. Once she caught sight of the state of Basil she exclaimed unintelligibly and through the feathers in the air again.</p><p>“Goodness, what’s become of you now?”</p><p>“Dear Mrs. Judson, I have recently been exploring some of the city’s sewer drainages and I would greatly appreciate if you would draw me a bath and then do not disturb me for the remainder of the evening as I have much to consider,” Basil rushed out in one breath, affecting what he hoped was a busy but pleasant tone of voice. “Oh, and good evening,” Basil added, remembering that it was the polite thing to do.</p><p>The landlady blinked at him, stunned, which wasn’t in itself unusual. He could see her taking in his haggard appearance, her nostrils twitching at the smell which was invading the room.</p><p>“A bath, sir. Yes, of course, I’ll draw you a bath” she said flatly and turned slowly away towards the bathroom. He heard her mutter under her breath as she exited, “Maybe two.”</p><p>Basil made a mental note to apologize to her about the mess when he had a chance. He couldn’t help bringing work into the house, but he did usually try to leave the muck outside. He rushed into the back room, which was meant to be his bedroom. He had spent so few nights there recently that the bed was completely covered in books and maps and old case materials which had migrated out of the front room. Basil quickly began grabbing books and shoving them on any other available surface, bundling up the maps and charts and documents and pushing them behind one of the many overfull bookcases. After a few minutes of frantic activity, he had managed to clear most of the bed. It would still be too small for Ratigan, but it was the best Basil could do. If the Professor survived the night, he would just have to tolerate the few books which had become wedged between the mattress and the wall. Basil next set to clearing a pathway from the door to the bed, knowing that it would be even harder to drag Ratigan through his house than it had been to pull him through the sewer.</p><p>Finally, Basil was satisfied that he would be able to get Ratigan’s bulk through the space and he went to see if Mrs. Judson had finished with the bath. She had already left the bathroom, though he saw that she had placed all of the soaps he owned next to the tub as a pointed gesture. Basil rushed back outside to where Toby was waiting for him dutifully.</p><p>“Now, put him here, Toby,” he instructed, pointing into the open doorway. Toby’s mouth was far too large to fit through the door at all, but he was a smart dog. Basil watched as he gently placed the limp body of Ratigan in the doorway and used his nose to push him as far inside the room as possible. “Very good, old boy! I will be sure to bring you some of Mrs. Judson’s cheese crumpets when I call on you next.”</p><p>Toby went to nuzzle at Basil as he usually did when they parted, but seemed to think better of it given how filthy the detective still was. As soon as the dog had departed, Basil uncovered one of Ratigan’s wrists to verify that he was still alive. The pulse was still there. Still weak, but undeniably beating against Basil’s fingertips. For the second time that evening he set to dragging the Professor’s immense body where he needed it.</p><p>Hoping dearly that Mrs. Judson would not come and investigate the many bumps and crashes which sounded from the room, Basil managed to get Ratigan into his bed. Basil doubled over wheezing, his ribs aching from the abuse of the past days. He glanced over to Ratigan and from the new position he could see the subtle rise and fall of that furry chest.</p><p><em>He’s alive</em>, Basil thought, looking up. It echoed through his mind. <em>He’s alive, he’s alive, he’s alive.</em> He took a step closer, looking down at that face he had spent so many hours studying. He’d never seen it like this before; eyes closed, unguarded, vulnerable. It was almost like the Professor was sleeping, laid bare before him.</p><p>
  <em>He’s alive.</em>
</p><p>Unconsciously, Basil reached out a hand to stroke the fur on Ratigan’s rising chest, but he recoiled. He gripped his right arm and squeaked in pain. Basil hadn’t realized that he had lost his sling somewhere in the evening’s activities. He looked down at himself, taking in his ruined clothes, the pain he felt all over, his trouble standing up straight. He’d almost broken himself getting Ratigan to Baker Street and why?</p><p>Basil looked at Ratigan’s steady-but-shallow breathing. The thought drummed in the back of his mind like rain on a window.</p><p>
  <em>He’s alive.</em>
</p><p>Basil decided to take his bath.</p><p> </p><p>--</p><p> </p><p>After thoroughly washing himself, Basil filled the small extra basin in the bathroom with water and carefully brought it into the back room. He collected as many rags as he could find in the flat and several bottles of antiseptic that he kept on hand for emergencies. He immediately checked for the movement of Ratigan’s chest and was relieved that he was still breathing. Basil didn’t let himself stop to think about why Ratigan being alive was helping him breathe himself.</p><p>He set to work cleaning all of the sewer sludge out of Ratigan’s fur, untangling what he could and resorting to cutting away the most matted clumps. As he went he seemed to uncover a new injury every few minutes. There were deep cuts all over his arms which he took special care to disinfect and bandage. The smaller cuts had mostly stopped oozing and he was short on supplies, so Basil hoped that rubbing antiseptic into them would be enough without a plaster over it.</p><p>As he worked over the body he had to remove the last few shreds of fabric which had clung to the Professor, planning to burn them when he had the chance. There wasn’t much, just a bit of trouser, the waist and one sleeve of his shirt, the upper remains of the cape. As Basil slid a cuff down one arm, he was held up by Ratigan’s hands. It wasn’t the size or the claws that caught Basil’s attention this time, however. It was the multitude of small blisters and subtle calluses across Ratigan’s fingers. Basil knew what it meant instantly, the same way he knew Dawson was a doctor or that most people who met Basil found him insufferable. His mind would supply answers whether he wanted them or not.</p><p>Ratigan played the harp. He was a musician. His hands were covered in the evidence of hours upon hours of practice. Ratigan was a <em>dedicated</em> musician. His palms were soft and smooth, undamaged. He knew his proper form when playing and maintained it. The blisters were fresh, almost as fresh as the rest of his wounds. Ratigan had been playing the harp sometime in the past few days, likely just the day before his fall. In the midst of the greatest scheme of his life, as all of his plans were supposedly coming together, the criminal mastermind had taken precious hours out of his day to play a beautiful instrument.</p><p>“Cruel trick,” Basil heard and he snapped his head up to see that Ratigan’s eyes were open and looking at him.</p><p>“What’s a cruel trick?” he asked, but already the Professor’s eyes were losing focus and sliding shut. “Ratigan, <em>what</em> is a cruel trick?!”</p><p>Basil thought he saw Ratigan’s lips move around a single syllable, but there was no sound other than the return of shallow breathing. He was unconscious again. Basil remembered that two days prior he had broken his own instrument and he let go of Ratigan’s hand. When he picked up a new rag to continue cleaning, Basil felt his own much rougher calluses catch on the fabric. He pushed on.</p><p>The detective did his best to clean Ratigan’s back without causing too much stress on any of the body’s injuries, but he was sure he did a poor job. Aside from the weight of the rat body and his own flagging energy, Basil kept getting distracted by Ratigan’s fur. It was almost a pity to have to cut so much of it off. The fur on the Professor’s stomach was a paler brown than that on his arms and back. Basil’s eyes traced the odd light blaze down Ratigan’s face and onto his chest. Not many rodents had marks like that, at least not those who lived apart from humans. There were several patches of unusual fur on Ratigan’s body, such as the black patch that sat between his ears and white dappled across his right side. Slowly, Basil ran his fingers along one of the white spots over Ratigan’s ribs. He had never known that Ratigan had such unusual coat pattern. The Professor had always been completely covered. Basil hadn’t even seen his hands until the clock tower.</p><p>The ribs under his hand jerked suddenly and Basil snapped his eyes up to Ratigan’s face. The eyes were still closed, but there was tension where there hadn’t been before. Basil removed his fingers slowly, but the tension did not entirely leave.</p><p> </p><p>--</p><p> </p><p>Three hours after he started working, Basil reclined against the desk opposite the bed and puffed on his pipe. It had taken that long before the detective was completely satisfied that he had done what he could, given his current supplies and knowledge. Ratigan had begun coming to more often, particularly as Basil found more severe injuries, but he rarely stayed conscious for longer than a few seconds. He hadn’t said anything more than “You” any of those times, and Basil was grateful to postpone the inevitable conversation.</p><p>Basil had meticulously catalogued each injury in his mind and sorted out those which were the most serious. He had been able to disinfect every abrasion and set several broken fingers on Ratigan’s left hand, a skill he had learned the hard way after he first took up boxing. He had done his best to immobilize the bones in Ratigan’s right leg, he was sure something was fractured or even broken in it but he hadn’t been able to determine what specific bones had been damaged. The foot on that leg had been difficult to look at long enough to clean, several of the toes were hanging in sickeningly unnatural ways and the whole foot had blushed black with bruising. Basil suspected that if Dr. Dawson was there, he would recommend amputation.</p><p>The current trouble was that in moving Ratigan to clean his back, Basil had discovered that the Professor’s right shoulder had been dislocated. Basil could reset it; he had done so with his own shoulder before after a criminal got the better of him on a case. He was also quite certain that the dislocation wasn’t the worst injury Ratigan had received. However, the swelling around the shoulder was apparent even under the thick fur of Ratigan’s shoulder and from experience Basil knew that resetting a dislocated arm was shockingly painful. Basil weighed the risks of waking Ratigan or letting the joint become even more inflamed.</p><p>“Well,” he started, looking for a clever turn of phrase to explain his decision. Finding none, he made the choice he had always been going to make anyway. It was the same choice he had been making all day. He put down his pipe and moved towards Ratigan.</p><p>It was fortunate that Basil had experience putting shoulders back into place. If he hadn’t known what he was doing, he may have been too slow to get the job done before Ratigan grabbed him by the neck and threw him down.</p><p>Ratigan bellowed in pain and screamed “You bastard!” loud enough to shake the glass in the cabinets. When Basil tried to get to his knees so that he could breathe again, the rat’s claws sunk into the scruff of his neck and dragged him up. They were face to face and Ratigan looked just like he had in the clock tower, wild and angry and hurting and with blood in his eyes. He looked feral in a way Basil felt right down to his bones, all sharp teeth and eyes too focused.</p><p>“What did you do to me, you wretch?” Ratigan hissed at him. Basil struggled to formulate an answer to that question, he had done a lot of things to Ratigan in the last few hours and even more in the last few days and it was very hard to think with those claws gripping his scruff so tightly that he couldn’t even lean on the bed for support. Before he could get any words out, he saw the sideways flicker of Ratigan’s eyes as the Professor took in their surroundings. “Where the devil am I?”</p><p>That was a much simpler question to answer, so Basil did. “You are in my home.”</p><p>The claws on the back of Basil’s neck tightened and he winced. Ratigan growled at him, “What?”</p><p>“My home. Where else could I have brought you?”</p><p>“Why am I in your home, Basil of Baker Street?” The last part was spat, as Basil’s name usually was by the Professor.</p><p>“You fell from the clock face. I was searching for the body and I found you in the sewer. I brought you here. It’s not that complicated, you-“</p><p>He was cut off as Ratigan shook him violently.</p><p>“I know <em>what</em> happened to me you meddling runt, I asked <em>why</em>?”</p><p>Basil hesitated a moment. He had been avoiding asking himself the same question so far that night.</p><p>“You were alive.”</p><p>It wasn’t really an answer for either of them, but it was all Basil had at that moment. Ratigan’s heart had been beating, Basil brought him home. Ratigan’s eyes searched his face but seemed to find no deceit there, because the claws on Basil’s neck relaxed enough that Basil could lean into the bed for support. The hand didn’t leave for a few more moments after that, as the two of them continued to stare at each other.</p><p>Finally, Ratigan pulled away and laid his arm down next to his body, closing his eyes against the pain. Basil took his chance and stood to leave, the room suddenly felt suffocating and his head was swirling. As his foot crossed the doorway he was stopped by Ratigan’s voice, quieter and calmer than before.</p><p>“Am to be I your prisoner?”</p><p>Basil felt the old wood of the door frame splinter away under his fingertips. He gripped the frame hard to stop himself from turning around and looking at Ratigan again. He blew all the breath out of his lungs and shut his eyes.</p><p>“Yes.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>hey look the victorian rodent lads have had a conversation yay me</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
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